DanInAZ wrote:Unless we shoot 50% or better from the perimeter we will lose by 20+ to SH. I've watched more of SH games over the past 35+ years than I have Rhody (lived about 10 minutes away growing up In NJ, dad friends w/ PJ, etc). They are primed to be a Final 4 team imho. Delgado is going to take our frontcourt behind the shed and have them for lunch...

With or w/o EC we lose unless we shoot the lights out, and at the FT line too. Must be focused. A nice dinner bet w/ my brother is at stake.

(Fun puns galore)

I had us as an double digit L against Seton Hall with EC. They are on another level this year and we have zero hope against Delgado. Hass would have trouble with him never mind our current frontcourt.

We need to go 1-1 on the trip and I'll be happy. I've seen posts like Nevada or Virginia could be the best team we play this year. It's Seton Hall.... Virginia is on a down year. Still good but nothing special.

I agree. I see Garrett at the 1, Dowtin at 2, and Terrell at the 3 w Stan off the bench. There is not much of a statistic difference between Stan and EC. Won’t have as much depth but it will give Fatts a chance to shine like Dowtin did last year.

If we are 4-4 going into College of Charleston I think we'll be in really good shape for a stretch run. Of course that means getting a win against Seton Hall, Vanderbilt/Virginia, Providence or Alabama which is easier said than done.

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“We’re going to get better in the future. Coach Hurley’s history speaks for itself. I came here because I wanted to be part of his program, to help get things rolling, to help build a program," E.C. Matthews

RhowdyRam02 wrote:If we are 4-4 going into College of Charleston I think we'll be in really good shape for a stretch run. Of course that means getting a win against Seton Hall, Vanderbilt/Virginia, Providence or Alabama which is easier said than done.

1 win against those teams is not an accomplishment. and 500 to that point is a major disappointment.

I like EC a lot. He had one great stretch last year during the A10 Tournament. Jared is the best player on the team. This year I think Stan looks very good. He is confident. Best defensive player on the team. I also this Jarvis is going to have a breakout Sr year. He has looked good. Losing EC will hurt the 4G option the most. I would start Stan at the 3 because he is the best rebounder and we need his help down low. Jarvis coming off the bench will allow Dan to sub for Dowtin, Jared and Stan. Obviously Fatts will play more. I like Fatts and he will improve during the year with playing time. I also think this means more playing time for Berry, Akele and hopefully Preston (please Dan).

The thing with Stan is that he has never shown the ability to be consistent over a stretch of games. He has had games of brilliance (George Mason and Oregon obvi come to mind) but he also can get taken out of his game through early fouls or bonehead turnovers and virtually disappear. He was a highly rated 4 star, with all the athletic tools needed, we REALLLLLLLLLLLY need him to play the best basketball of his life for the next 4 months. Especially for the next 2.

Trying to stay positive with this latest dose of bad news is tricky. From the overall perspective, I believe the team needs a regular season record of 22-7 or 23-6 to get into the NCAA at large. EC will likely miss the entire OOC where we have five games important to resume building for an at large bid - at Nevada, Seton Hall at Barclay's, Virginia/Vandy at Barclays, PC, at Alabama - we are 0-1 so far and if we were to lose all five games, then we have to go 16-2 in conference. This scenario plus a loss to any of the other OOC opponents will kill any at large hopes. URI can do it, but it requires EC to be back and fully churning for the conference schedule.

bigappleram wrote:The thing with Stan is that he has never shown the ability to be consistent over a stretch of games. He has had games of brilliance (George Mason and Oregon obvi come to mind) but he also can get taken out of his game through early fouls or bonehead turnovers and virtually disappear. He was a highly rated 4 star, with all the athletic tools needed, we REALLLLLLLLLLLY need him to play the best basketball of his life for the next 4 months. Especially for the next 2.

I wouldn't call EC consistent either, probably more consistent than Stan but EC definitely has his fair share of bonehead turnovers and disappearing during the game. Tough to compare the two but I'd imagine if Stan played a similar role as to what EC plays he'd look a lot more consistent.

I'm a huge Stan fan so I might be biased but I think if he stays out of foul trouble and could get 25-30 min/game he'd have an enormous impact.

Someone else posted this video (maybe a different angle - can't remember) in response to Rothstein's tweet saying it was clean. There is no version in which that is clean.

Edit: It was the same Twitter account that I had responded to and the same video. The Twitter responded he was being sarcastic when he said, "Looked like a clean play to me." (He did have the eye-roll emoticon next to it. I need to brush up on that).

Someone else posted this video (maybe a different angle - can't remember) in response to Rothstein's tweet saying it was clean. There is no version in which that is clean.

Edit: It was the same Twitter account that I had responded to and the same video. The Twitter responded he was being sarcastic when he said, "Looked like a clean play to me." (He did have the eye-roll emoticon next to it. I need to brush up on that).

Does it really matter if it was a foul or not? I don't think it would've been a flagrant and Akele scored after the block anyways. It really had no effect on the game other than being a bad call.

Someone else posted this video (maybe a different angle - can't remember) in response to Rothstein's tweet saying it was clean. There is no version in which that is clean.

Edit: It was the same Twitter account that I had responded to and the same video. The Twitter responded he was being sarcastic when he said, "Looked like a clean play to me." (He did have the eye-roll emoticon next to it. I need to brush up on that).

Does it really matter if it was a foul or not? I don't think it would've been a flagrant and Akele scored after the block anyways. It really had no effect on the game other than being a bad call.

No, for that particular play in and of itself, it doesn't matter. EC gets injured regardless. What does matter is the fact that URI got fouls called consistently on them that Nevada's defense did not. If the game was called more fairly, perhaps the injury doesn't happen. The play is different. The defense doesn't play the same way and EC doesn't go to the ground like that and fracture his wrist.

steviep123 wrote:Someone else posted this video (maybe a different angle - can't remember) in response to Rothstein's tweet saying it was clean. There is no version in which that is clean.

Edit: It was the same Twitter account that I had responded to and the same video. The Twitter responded he was being sarcastic when he said, "Looked like a clean play to me." (He did have the eye-roll emoticon next to it. I need to brush up on that).

Does it really matter if it was a foul or not? I don't think it would've been a flagrant and Akele scored after the block anyways. It really had no effect on the game other than being a bad call.

No, for that particular play in and of itself, it doesn't matter. EC gets injured regardless. What does matter is the fact that URI got fouls called consistently on them that Nevada's defense did not. If the game was called more fairly, perhaps the injury doesn't happen. The play is different. The defense doesn't play the same way and EC doesn't go to the ground like that and fracture his wrist.

I somewhat disagree with this. Yes, there was a huge discrepency in the fouls but I feel it had more to do with the coaching on both sides more than the officiating, you're going to have bad calls in every game, but in no way did we lose this game due to officiating. Their coach recognized that we could not guard them in the paint and he continually threw the ball inside to Caroline in isolation where we had nobody to defend him (thats just good coaching). When a team constantly attacks the rim you are going to accumulate alot of fouls. We again made no adjustments (zone defense, cough, cough) to force Nevada to shoot from the outside or just give them a different look on the defensive end where you can protect some players from foul trouble. Our offense is reliant on us scoring outside of the paint or scoring in transition, which means we wont get to the line as often. My bigger concern is how we seem to always get behind early in all these big OOC games and have to scratch our way back into the game, almost like we need to be kicked in the teeth before we respond.

I'm also of the belief that losing EC is going to be a much bigger deal than what I'm reading on this board. I'm a big Stan guy also, but Stan/Fatts and whoever is not going to give us the production of what EC brings. We have few players who can take over a game like EC can and we are now much easier to guard. I had us losing 5 games in the OOC with EC, without him it that much tougher, I'm already cringing at what Delgado might do to our front court.

Billyboy78 wrote:I think atrophy of the muscles in his left arm would be the #1 concern. He might need a short rehab period once the cast comes off to regain the strength in that arm.

Exactly. I'm also a lefty and fractured my arm in two places while in middle school. Once the hard cast was off, they placed me in a soft cast and I remember squeezing silly putty to re-strengthen my arm muscles (needed only about a week or so to feel normal again). I'm sure he'll be working with PT and the ortho while he's healing.

Blargh, this sucks. I actually just fractured my wrist (one of the little carpal bones) back in late July or early August (some guy got extra chippy in a rec game and intentionally charged me). I am still not back 100%, keep thinking I am like a week away but it's just taking so damn long to heal. To be fair, I waited weeks before going to get an x ray and wasn't as good as I should have been about immobilization.

Hopefully good prompt care get's him back within the timeframe (and being 10 years younger than me doesn't hurt).

With his loss this makes the 4 guard lineup more difficult to utilize for long stretches, which will force us to play more of a traditional lineup...if they can stay on the floor...

After a small 2 game sample, I would not categorize any of our bigs as A10 starting quality.

RIFan wrote:Brutal...get well soon EC!

With his loss this makes the 4 guard lineup more difficult to utilize for long stretches, which will force us to play more of a traditional lineup...if they can stay on the floor...

After a small 2 game sample, I would not categorize any of our bigs as A10 starting quality.

2 game sample maybe not, but you can't make that statement if you watched Cyril towards the end of last year. The A10 doesn't have many quality bigs - I'd rank Cyril as one of the more promising big prospects in the league with a game that is absolutely A10 starting quality on just about every team based on his current skill set.

With his loss this makes the 4 guard lineup more difficult to utilize for long stretches, which will force us to play more of a traditional lineup...if they can stay on the floor...

After a small 2 game sample, I would not categorize any of our bigs as A10 starting quality.

RIFan wrote:Brutal...get well soon EC!

With his loss this makes the 4 guard lineup more difficult to utilize for long stretches, which will force us to play more of a traditional lineup...if they can stay on the floor...

After a small 2 game sample, I would not categorize any of our bigs as A10 starting quality.

2 game sample maybe not, but you can't make that statement if you watched Cyril towards the end of last year. The A10 doesn't have many quality bigs - I'd rank Cyril as one of the more promising big prospects in the league with a game that is absolutely A10 starting quality on just about every team based on his current skill set.

I watched last season and thought the same as you...just waiting for that Cyril to show up this year...since that's the one that counts...Do we ever think that maybe he looked that good because there was another quality big that the other team had to deal with playing alongside him? I'm not saying that's the case, but maybe there's an adjustment to being the primary big man.

With his loss this makes the 4 guard lineup more difficult to utilize for long stretches, which will force us to play more of a traditional lineup...if they can stay on the floor...

After a small 2 game sample, I would not categorize any of our bigs as A10 starting quality.

RIFan wrote:Brutal...get well soon EC!

With his loss this makes the 4 guard lineup more difficult to utilize for long stretches, which will force us to play more of a traditional lineup...if they can stay on the floor...

After a small 2 game sample, I would not categorize any of our bigs as A10 starting quality.

2 game sample maybe not, but you can't make that statement if you watched Cyril towards the end of last year. The A10 doesn't have many quality bigs - I'd rank Cyril as one of the more promising big prospects in the league with a game that is absolutely A10 starting quality on just about every team based on his current skill set.

I watched last season and thought the same as you...just waiting for that Cyril to show up this year...since that's the one that counts...Do we ever think that maybe he looked that good because there was another quality big that the other team had to deal with playing alongside him? I'm not saying that's the case, but maybe there's an adjustment to being the primary big man.

I've seen at least a half dozen posts claiming EC was "pulled down by the wrist". I"ve watched the play at least two dozen times and still fail to see how anyone comes to that conclusion. EC's momentum is taking him to the basket. The defender, going the other direction, had some ball and some hand/wrist. With EC in the air, of course he is going to land awkwardly. I don't believe there was any malicious intent by the defender (and if you believe he pulled EC down by the wrist, you believe the intent was malicious). Probably should have been a foul called, but even if the defender had all ball, EC was going to fall awkwardly anyway. And the fact there was no foul called actually benefitted us as Akele was able to get a garbage two out of it.

There is too much complaining about officials. There are just a few on this board that are not blaming officiating and instead giving credit to good coaching and a commitment to get the ball into the post to a player that was drawing foul after foul. URI's interior defense was poor at best. They didn't play defense with their feet. They constantly reached in. And there was no attempt to make adjustments.

I read another post claiming every charge/block seemed to go against us and they kept getting and 1s. There were actually 3 blocks called in the game. Two for them and One against us...and we were the only one that got an and 1 (I believe Nevada had one or two and ones the entire game). There were 4 charges called. Two on each side. Unfortunately, our two (Dowtin and Garrett) wiped out baskets, but in both cases the correct call was made.

I haven't read one "we got lucky when Terrell got his pocket picked" post. That was 110% a clean pick. Nevada should have had a layup instead we get 2 free throws, Four point swing. Nobody here complaining about that. And if you watch the game closely, there were plenty of ticky tack fouls against them as well. We committed a few overly aggressive fouls (ie, Robinsion undercutting the receiver of an outlet pass, Fatts foul 35 feet from the basket, and Terrell's reach in on the rebound for his 5th). Most of the rest were just not playing good defense.

For once I would like to see us lose a game because the other team was just better on that particular night.

RhodyRam86 wrote:I've seen at least a half dozen posts claiming EC was "pulled down by the wrist". I"ve watched the play at least two dozen times and still fail to see how anyone comes to that conclusion. EC's momentum is taking him to the basket. The defender, going the other direction, had some ball and some hand/wrist. With EC in the air, of course he is going to land awkwardly. I don't believe there was any malicious intent by the defender (and if you believe he pulled EC down by the wrist, you believe the intent was malicious). Probably should have been a foul called, but even if the defender had all ball, EC was going to fall awkwardly anyway. And the fact there was no foul called actually benefitted us as Akele was able to get a garbage two out of it.

There is too much complaining about officials. There are just a few on this board that are not blaming officiating and instead giving credit to good coaching and a commitment to get the ball into the post to a player that was drawing foul after foul. URI's interior defense was poor at best. They didn't play defense with their feet. They constantly reached in. And there was no attempt to make adjustments.

I read another post claiming every charge/block seemed to go against us and they kept getting and 1s. There were actually 3 blocks called in the game. Two for them and One against us...and we were the only one that got an and 1 (I believe Nevada had one or two and ones the entire game). There were 4 charges called. Two on each side. Unfortunately, our two (Dowtin and Garrett) wiped out baskets, but in both cases the correct call was made.

I haven't read one "we got lucky when Terrell got his pocket picked" post. That was 110% a clean pick. Nevada should have had a layup instead we get 2 free throws, Four point swing. Nobody here complaining about that. And if you watch the game closely, there were plenty of ticky tack fouls against them as well. We committed a few overly aggressive fouls (ie, Robinsion undercutting the receiver of an outlet pass, Fatts foul 35 feet from the basket, and Terrell's reach in on the rebound for his 5th). Most of the rest were just not playing good defense.

For once I would like to see us lose a game because the other team was just better on that particular night.

No,this is what I wrote in the game thread..............

ramster wrote:I didn't think the Ref's called the game in favor of Nevada, we just had more fouls. Quite a few offensive fouls driving the lane by EC, JT, JG, Dowtin. Nevada set up to take the charges. Some could have gone either way but they seemed to look to draw the offensive fouls - we do not set up to draw the offensive fouls very well - not yet anyway. I thought it was a clean pick by Martin on Terrell late, and announcers thought for sure it was clean. URI got a break there.

But the big difference was we could not stop Caroline inside. He drove in at will and always got his shots off. Nobody could slow him down or stop him, only way was to foul him. He was 7-13 FG, 12 rebounds, 14-17 FTs and 28 points. We made him look better than he really is.We had only 1 blocked shot in the game - a nice block on a break by Dowtin - but not a single block from any of our 4 big men.

ramster wrote:I didn't think the Ref's called the game in favor of Nevada, we just had more fouls. Quite a few offensive fouls driving the lane by EC, JT, JG, Dowtin. Nevada set up to take the charges. Some could have gone either way but they seemed to look to draw the offensive fouls - we do not set up to draw the offensive fouls very well - not yet anyway. I thought it was a clean pick by Martin on Terrell late, and announcers thought for sure it was clean. URI got a break there.

But the big difference was we could not stop Caroline inside. He drove in at will and always got his shots off. Nobody could slow him down or stop him, only way was to foul him. He was 7-13 FG, 12 rebounds, 14-17 FTs and 28 points. We made him look better than he really is.We had only 1 blocked shot in the game - a nice block on a break by Dowtin - but not a single block from any of our 4 big men.

[/quote]

My apologies Ramster. I did see your post on the other thread. You are one of only 2 or 3 that commented on that.

RhodyRam86 wrote:No,this is what I wrote in the game thread..............

ramster wrote:I didn't think the Ref's called the game in favor of Nevada, we just had more fouls. Quite a few offensive fouls driving the lane by EC, JT, JG, Dowtin. Nevada set up to take the charges. Some could have gone either way but they seemed to look to draw the offensive fouls - we do not set up to draw the offensive fouls very well - not yet anyway. I thought it was a clean pick by Martin on Terrell late, and announcers thought for sure it was clean. URI got a break there.

But the big difference was we could not stop Caroline inside. He drove in at will and always got his shots off. Nobody could slow him down or stop him, only way was to foul him. He was 7-13 FG, 12 rebounds, 14-17 FTs and 28 points. We made him look better than he really is.We had only 1 blocked shot in the game - a nice block on a break by Dowtin - but not a single block from any of our 4 big men.

My apologies Ramster. I did see your post on the other thread. You are one of only 2 or 3 that commented on that.[/quote]

No problem.No doubt the fouls went heavily against us, but the reality of it is we could not stop Caroline or the Twins down low. I did not think the refs favored one team or the other. I would have called a foul on the EC play, but there are not many calls I could argue with. But on the bright side we played a tough team on the other side of the country with a big line up of talented athletes and held out own - but we got exposed down low. Better to have that happen now then later in the season - time to make adjustments. Big, big shoes to fill in Martin and Iverson. We will not replace those two guys but we must come as close as we can if we are to achieve our goals.Only 1 blocked shot for URI - and that was from Dowtin.For sure Dan, the Coaching Staff and the Players themselves were humbled.

RhodyRam86 wrote:I've seen at least a half dozen posts claiming EC was "pulled down by the wrist". I"ve watched the play at least two dozen times and still fail to see how anyone comes to that conclusion. EC's momentum is taking him to the basket. The defender, going the other direction, had some ball and some hand/wrist. With EC in the air, of course he is going to land awkwardly. I don't believe there was any malicious intent by the defender (and if you believe he pulled EC down by the wrist, you believe the intent was malicious). Probably should have been a foul called, but even if the defender had all ball, EC was going to fall awkwardly anyway. And the fact there was no foul called actually benefitted us as Akele was able to get a garbage two out of it.

There is too much complaining about officials. There are just a few on this board that are not blaming officiating and instead giving credit to good coaching and a commitment to get the ball into the post to a player that was drawing foul after foul. URI's interior defense was poor at best. They didn't play defense with their feet. They constantly reached in. And there was no attempt to make adjustments.

I read another post claiming every charge/block seemed to go against us and they kept getting and 1s. There were actually 3 blocks called in the game. Two for them and One against us...and we were the only one that got an and 1 (I believe Nevada had one or two and ones the entire game). There were 4 charges called. Two on each side. Unfortunately, our two (Dowtin and Garrett) wiped out baskets, but in both cases the correct call was made.

I haven't read one "we got lucky when Terrell got his pocket picked" post. That was 110% a clean pick. Nevada should have had a layup instead we get 2 free throws, Four point swing. Nobody here complaining about that. And if you watch the game closely, there were plenty of ticky tack fouls against them as well. We committed a few overly aggressive fouls (ie, Robinsion undercutting the receiver of an outlet pass, Fatts foul 35 feet from the basket, and Terrell's reach in on the rebound for his 5th). Most of the rest were just not playing good defense.

For once I would like to see us lose a game because the other team was just better on that particular night.

You have this wrong. Clearly no one has said there was any intent on the play. But clearly EC's wrist was grabbed during the block which caused him to fall. Watch his wrist and see if it snaps back when he is falling.

RhodyRam86 wrote:I've seen at least a half dozen posts claiming EC was "pulled down by the wrist". I"ve watched the play at least two dozen times and still fail to see how anyone comes to that conclusion. EC's momentum is taking him to the basket. The defender, going the other direction, had some ball and some hand/wrist. With EC in the air, of course he is going to land awkwardly. I don't believe there was any malicious intent by the defender (and if you believe he pulled EC down by the wrist, you believe the intent was malicious). Probably should have been a foul called, but even if the defender had all ball, EC was going to fall awkwardly anyway. And the fact there was no foul called actually benefitted us as Akele was able to get a garbage two out of it.

There is too much complaining about officials. There are just a few on this board that are not blaming officiating and instead giving credit to good coaching and a commitment to get the ball into the post to a player that was drawing foul after foul. URI's interior defense was poor at best. They didn't play defense with their feet. They constantly reached in. And there was no attempt to make adjustments.

I read another post claiming every charge/block seemed to go against us and they kept getting and 1s. There were actually 3 blocks called in the game. Two for them and One against us...and we were the only one that got an and 1 (I believe Nevada had one or two and ones the entire game). There were 4 charges called. Two on each side. Unfortunately, our two (Dowtin and Garrett) wiped out baskets, but in both cases the correct call was made.

I haven't read one "we got lucky when Terrell got his pocket picked" post. That was 110% a clean pick. Nevada should have had a layup instead we get 2 free throws, Four point swing. Nobody here complaining about that. And if you watch the game closely, there were plenty of ticky tack fouls against them as well. We committed a few overly aggressive fouls (ie, Robinsion undercutting the receiver of an outlet pass, Fatts foul 35 feet from the basket, and Terrell's reach in on the rebound for his 5th). Most of the rest were just not playing good defense.

For once I would like to see us lose a game because the other team was just better on that particular night.

You have this wrong. Clearly no one has said there was any intent on the play. But clearly EC's wrist was grabbed during the block which caused him to fall. Watch his wrist and see if it snaps back when he is falling.

Glad you replied blueram as it was your quote I was specifically referring to. "I hope someone files a complaint against that play because there is NO WAY that wasn't a foul. Dude pulled EC down by his wrist." When you say somebody "pulled EC down by his wrist", that certainly sounds malicious. And I disagree that he pulled him down at all. I think you have this wrong. There is definitely contact with the hand/wrist area and a foul should have been called, but I do not see how you can say he grabbed the wrist and pulled him down. I don't see a grab or a pull. In fact, if there is a grab and/or pull then I would say there was malicious intent.